A very solid indie survival horror game with a mix of DNA from old-school and newer entries.
Try the demo, it should give a good idea of what to expect.
I played this in the over-the-shoulder mode but it has a fixed camera option as well, and what I appreciated a lot was that this stuck to pure core gameplay loop philosophy without the need to throw in those typical AAA gimmick staples like some forced stealth section, a QTE section (enemy grabs do act as minor QTEs but that's kind of just part of the regular loop), some turret section or escorting an NPC or falling down some slide dodging grates-- You know the stuff, the nonsense they put into survival horror games because they're too afraid that people might get bored of the core gameplay and need constantly to be thrown down exploding buildings while dodging debris. Except survival/action horror is in my opinion a winning formula when mixed with a right balance of puzzles, metroidvania exploration, combat, resource and inventory management, then throw in some cutscenes to break things up and have the player move to new locations with new weapons and upgrades and enemies along the way and you really don't need to do anything more in my opinion.
Anyway, that's a side-rant.
Connection Nightmare Within starts with a very Evil Within inspired setup, but overall once you play the game you'll be mostly exploring, unlocking, fighting and puzzling with occasional cutscenes that feels like it's that classic formula from 1994-2001.
This being an indie game the combat isn't quite as juicy as its AAA counterparts, shocker I know. Enemies do twitch from being hit, falter, sometimes even stagger from shots, but it seems to follow similar REmake rules of being chance based or crit based, and outside of that hitting enemies does feel a bit anemic. Enemy AI is acceptable for this type of game, they do throw in some neat curve balls with some enemies that jump sideways to avoid shots and more which you don't see many zombie-types in games do. But enemy designs aren't really anything to write home about, humanoid meat shapes, that's about it.
Weapon roster was relatively standard but still felt good to use, a pistol, later an smg which can replace the pistol, a shotgun, desert eagle, machete and electric grenade launcher. Aiming felt maybe a bit awkward especially in close quarters combat (maybe the hit detection or something), but you do have a dodge roll so might as well do all you can to avoid CQC (though machete did have its uses in some encounters).
A handful of boss fights, which can also be hit or miss, but that's kind of par of the course for most games.
The puzzles I struggled with a bit on standard difficulty, I kind of regret picking it instead of easy, I managed to beat all puzzles by myself without a guide (did need to sleep on it), but especially with the later doorcode to Kane's room I was banging my head against the wall (also guide didn't help, seemed randomized), if I'm replaying this I'm slapping that down to easy. I still appreciate the effort though, they were classic survival horror puzzles.
Not the longest game, says I have 6 hours in it, but I do feel like it's worth a replay, beating the game unlocked some kind of bonus mode (seemed like a skirmish type deal, or mercenaries maybe) but no NG+ or some unlockable cheat weapons/items for a new playthrough or costumes as far as I could tell which is a mild shame.
For a unity engine game it looked surprisingly decent, devs seemed to use some custom solutions to certain things, I didn't see the usual SSAO shortcomings which often comes with the default Unity plugin, or some of the rougher shading issues I've seen in some with the specularity, bloom wasn't obnoxious either, game ran and looked pretty great, though it does follow in the trend of having an excessive amount of volumetrics (fog, rays) which seems common these days (think RTX on/off memes where suddenly everything turns into a smoggy silent hill the moment RTX is enabled), still, this being a survival horror game at least it fits the atmosphere. Did see some ghosting though, probably TAA or equivalent.
Character designs are maybe a bit goofy, lip syncing in cutscenes is rough, voice acting is stiff but that's true of many classics, it's not AI (VAs listed in credits) but I did notice that there are paintings and pictures in the game that look like AI, so make of that what you will.
Credits were really short, like 2-3 main devs short and most of the rest were the voice actors, composer, localization and such. It's an impressive feat with good production value from otherwise such a small team telling their own cheesy story with a solid foundation and good gameplay loop.
No bugs, crashes or other rough edges outside of what you can expect from a limited budget & team.
I liked it, I hope the best for the devs, if they plan some sequel based on one of the different endings, and again try the demo which is representative of the main game.
